Business Management: Planning and Organization
**Directed Tasks of Government and Security Criteria**
Directed tasks of government establish appropriate security criteria for the achievement of goals.
**Planning: Setting Goals and Strategies**
Planning involves setting goals, establishing strategies to achieve them, and defining and establishing criteria, policies, and decisions for the company.
**Classification of Plans**
By Nature and Characteristics
- Objectives: Distinguish between objectives that involve the entire company and sub-objectives that refer to specific areas of the organization. Goals should be realistic, take advantage of the environment, prioritize goals and sub-objectives, achieve the minimum cost with minimum unintended consequences, and ensure subsystems have resources to achieve them.
- Budget: Plans are quantified; the numerical expression of a written plan.
Temporal Dimension
- Long Term: Plans that are expected to be achieved in a period longer than five years.
- Medium Term: Plans that are expected to be achieved in a period longer than one year but less than five years.
- Short Term: Plans that are expected to be achieved within one year.
**Stages of Planning**
- Analysis of the Initial Situation: Analyze the current situation of the company and its environment.
- Setting Goals: Define both the general objectives and sub-objectives.
- Creation of Alternatives: Identify different paths towards the company’s objectives.
- Evaluation of Alternatives: Evaluate and analyze each of the action lines.
- Election of an Alternative: Decide which plan will be executed.
- Control and Determination of Deviations: Modify the alternative if it is incorrect.
**Role of Organization**
Organization aims to design a structure in which all defined tasks are outlined, indicating who is responsible for each task within the company, along with their responsibilities and authority.
**Stages of the Organizational Process**
- Determine the level of organization (clarify the hierarchy).
- Assign the roles of each level of command (assign authority and responsibility).
- Define relationships between different levels of organization (they must be coordinated and linked).
- Distribute the roles and objectives for each person.
- Define lines of communication with people working in the company in all directions.
**Communication in the Company**
- Upward: Vertical communication from bottom to top, the purpose of which is to identify worker problems.
- Descending: Vertical communication originating from management and ending with workers, the purpose of which is to inform staff of the company’s objectives and tasks.
- Horizontal: Communication that originates between people at the same hierarchical level.
Formal Organization: Authority, responsibility, communication, and coordination between elements of the company.
**Organizational Structure**
- Functions: Organized according to their specialization.
- By Product: Staff grouped according to the final product obtained.
- Process: Organized to follow the phases of production.
- By Geographical Area: Organized according to knowledge of the area where the product is intended.
Relations
- Linear: When there is a link between the commands.
- Staff: Aim for advice from specialists.
- Functional: A group of thematic specialists who have authority over all responsibilities related to their specialization.
**Organizational Models of Structure**
- Linear Model: Everyone depends on a superior; therefore, each person is immediately subordinate to a superior. Advantages: Simplicity. Disadvantages: Lack of specialization by managers.
- Functional Model: Characterized by the existence of specialists dedicated to a specific task. Advantages: Specialization. Disadvantages: Each worker can receive orders from more than one superior.
- Staff Model: Tries to solve the disadvantages of the linear and functional models. Advantages: Intervention of specialists. Disadvantages: Slow decision-making and potential conflicts between staff relations.
- Committee Model: Characterized by the cooperation of several people in authority and assuming responsibility. Advantages: Decisions are made from different viewpoints. Disadvantages: It takes time to make decisions.
- Matrix Model: Combines at least two organizational variables through authority relations. Advantages: Flexibility. Disadvantages: The need to combine and coordinate all the people involved in a project.
Organization
- Vertical Organization: Seeks out the hierarchy of command, also aims to highlight the direct and indirect relations of subordination.
- Horizontal Organization: The goal is to highlight the importance of the functions on the hierarchy of command.
- Radial Organization: Try to create a visual impact in the center to highlight the highest levels of management.
Organization According to the Purpose
- General: Provide global information about the company.
- Analysis: All the structure of the company’s organization appears in detail.
Organization Charts by Extension
- General: Reflect the entire general structure of the company.
- Detailed: The organization of a specific department of the company.
Organization Based on the Content
- Structural: Represent only the units that make up the company and their relationships.
- Staff: Only the people who occupy the units are represented.
- Functional: Reports are made about each of the units marked on the chart.
Informal Organization: When there are spontaneous relationships that are not in the organizational chart and affect the operation of the company.